SURVIVING MASTECTOMY… Everyday Solutions for Breast Cancer Survivors

Monthly Archives: May 2017

I have needed to update my readers for awhile, but waited because every single day, I’d think my husband would recover, return home, and our normal life would resume. My website basically was closed these last months as far as answering emails or sewing for survivors. But, my husband never got to return home after a trip to the emergency room in early December.

He tried bravely for well over five hospitalized months to recover, and I was there with him averaging 12 hours a day, often more, for approximately 160 DAYS. He had many complications arise due to the Lymphoma originally caused by Humira injections taken for years for his Rheumatoid Arthritis. He miraculously survived each and every crisis that came along, until the end.

That, and the story of how he was additionally harmed by dozens of medical errors as well, would make quite a movie, but who would believe it. It was far beyond what anyone could possibly imagine. There were also specialists who did amazing jobs of caring for him and bringing him back to better health after each crisis, and I will forever be grateful for what they did, giving us more time together and hope. Two were brilliant women, one in particular should have a movie written just about HER. There aren’t enough words to do her justice.

The end result though is that just days after we reached our 40th wedding anniversary, while still in the hospital but having just made arrangements to bring him home, his dear heart gave out and he spent his last 3 days unconscious in ICU. He passed gently away on May 19th while I whispered ‘I love you’ in his ear over and over and held his hand. Half my own heart left me that moment.

I am not abandoning you, dear survivors, but after all these months without a break, I need a rest to recover. It’s hard to learn how to start life over, without your best friend there to hold your hand anymore, but I’ll do it with God’s help.

As you survivors know, living through breast cancer is tough, likely the toughest thing you’ve done… but after you have already done that, you begin to realize that you can probably survive almost anything you never thought you could. God willing, I am going to try to get through this next few days or weeks, and I’ll be back.